Sometimes gulp del cause EPERM error

[havenchyk]

Hi.

I'm trying del in my clean task.

gulp.task('clean', function(cb) {
 del('build/**', cb);
});

gulp.task('build', ['clean'], function() {
    ...
});

And from time to time during running build task I've got

'clean' errored after 24 ms
Error: EPERM, rmdir 'D:\dev\projects...

OS: Windows 7.

Is it problem of my implementation or just wrong behavior on Windows?

Sorry if it's not a good place to post this problem.

Thanks

[sindresorhus]

EPERM means it doesn't have permission to delete the folder. You probably have the wrong permission set on that folder.

[havenchyk]

@sindresorhus, yeah, I understand, what means EPERM, but it happens only from time to time.

E.g. I run

1. gulp build
   result correct (starting clean, finished clean)
   ...
   trying again
   n) gulp build
   and got "starting clean EPERM error".
   n+1) gulp build
   correct

[havenchyk]

Could it be a problem of pattern?

'build/**'

[robrich]

Generally this happens on Windows because a virus scanner or other background service has the file open when you try to delete it. Thanks, MS -- a completely non-deterministic symptom. Are you on Windows?

[havenchyk]

@robich, Yes, I'm on windows. I'll try to disable antivirus but changing pattern from build/** to build solves problem. I suppose, that the problem can be in pattern. But my main suggestion is that del tries to remove folder during deliting file inside this folder. Is it possible?

[heikki]

@havenchyk Yes, see sindresorhus/del#10

[havenchyk]

Hmm. build/**/* also causes EPERM. Only build/**/*.* works without problem.

[havenchyk]

Could anyone explain, how to handle this type of errors? e.g. to repeat task with del() in case of error

[rmorse]

I'm not sure if it's related directly to your problem but I was also getting this error intermittently - although checking my files & folders, the task had successfully run.

Looking at your particular use case it doesn't seem like this applies but I hope this helps others:

First, I was also getting another issue with watch on my build picking up newly created files:
floatdrop/gulp-watch#1

After finding this solution and solving the problem above, my del issue disappeared too:

Basically when my globs started with ./ it caused this error - simply remove it so:

./scripts/**

would become:

scripts/**

(I'm on Windows 8)